


Thus The Basis of Her Appeal

by shopfront



Category: 10 Things I Hate About You (1999)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, F/F, Genderswap
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-09-21 12:24:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17043689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shopfront/pseuds/shopfront
Summary: Cameron and Michael think they're being subtle when they interview all of the dodgiest boys in school, trying to cast the role of Kat Stratford's boyfriend. Eventually Trish Verona takes pity on them and volunteers.





	Thus The Basis of Her Appeal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [patrokla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/patrokla/gifts).



Laughter is still dying on her tongue when Kat looks up again and catches Trish’s eye. Her next question also dies in her throat as her breath hitches and she hesitates.

“Tell me something true,” she demands, leaning in close to Patricia. The scent of paint overrides everything, but underneath it is the whiff of stale beer and pool hall chalk that seems to cling to Trish no matter the time of day or night, like that grubby little place she calls a bar has sunk deep into her pores.

She expects Trish to lean in closer and crack some joke, maybe try to kiss her a little. It seems to be her favourite move. But instead Trish hesitates and leans away.

“What’s truth?” she asks, turning her head to the side and gazing out across Kat’s front yard to the street. Her eyes squint against the light and she’s unnaturally still, sprawled back across the top of Kat’s porch stairs like a particularly lazy statue. Only her hands keep moving, picking constantly at the edge of her paint stained flannel shirt.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Kat asks, pulling a face. She licks her lips once, twice, not sure what to make of this new, serious Trish.

Trish shrugs, still avoiding Kat’s eyes. “We’ve already been telling each other true things all afternoon,” she points out with a quirk of one eyebrow and a smirk. But she’s still avoiding Kat’s eyes and the smugness fades away as quickly as it had appeared, as her lips pull into a tense, straight line that piques Kat’s suspicions.

“I suppose,” Kat says slowly. She leans back, narrowing her eyes as she examines Trish’s face. Opaque yet a little restless, it doesn’t give Kat any useful clues. A familiar feeling sinks low in her gut, riling her anger, and she breathes out hard through her nose. “So what else do you need to tell me, Trish?”

Trish opens her mouth, eyes finally flicking briefly back to Kat’s. Then she shuts it again and sits back up with a sigh, running a hand through her short hair. It springs up again, spiked into clumps with hair product and splashes of paint that leave crumbling blue residue in a dusty smear across her palm that makes her grimace and scrub her hand against her jeans.

“Don’t be mad,” she says.

“I’m already mad that you think it’s okay to tell me not to be,” Kat snaps back, letting the ball of tension in her belly burst into flames that lick up her spine and make her want to sneer and yell and bite. She holds it back with effort, peering closer at Trish’s face. She still doesn’t like what she sees there, but when Trish reaches for her Kat reluctantly lets Trish take her by the hands.

“I could make it up to you. Give you two truths for the price of one,” she says with her brightest, most winning smile. The same one she wore each time she asked Kat out and got shot down, only to bounce back the next day with the same smile to ask again.

Kat’s tempted to tell her to get on with it already. But she bites her tongue and raises an eyebrow in return, as archly as she knows how. Then she waits Trish out.

Trish’s smile tightens as the silence stretches. But once she starts speaking again, she doesn’t hesitate. “Those boys that follow your sister around, the little geeky ones. They think I’m dating you for the money.”

Kat blinks. Swallows. There’s a roaring noise rushing in her ears. She furrows her brow as she tries to pull back, to pull away, but suddenly Trish’s grip on her hands is like iron and for the slightest of moments Kat can admit that she feels too weak to break that hold.

“Which is the first truth, the one that you didn’t know. But hey, hey Kat. Kat, listen to me,” Trish says, squeezing Kat’s hands and leaning in closer, her brown eyes soft and anxious like they always are. The way they are that tempts Kat to trust her every day, against her better judgement. To say yes to each cheesy pick up line, no matter her misgivings and no matter how terrible an idea she knew it was.

She’d known better. She should have known better.

“Listen, Kat, please,” Trish is continuing, but now Kat is only half listening. Her eyes start to wander, her mind already racing far ahead of this conversation. Trish drops one of Kat’s hands to cup Kat’s cheek with her palm, trying to bring their gazes back together - and why on earth is Trish looking so worried, it’s not her day that’s just been ruined. Not her day that’s been turned into a lie. “The second truth is what they don’t know. Which is that I didn’t do it for the money, I did it because I wanted to. Because you fascinate me and I wanted to take you out. Kat, please. Say something.”

Kat gapes at her for a moment, screwing her face up in indignation as her mind goes blank. “Say something? You- what? Why would you- if you really- what kind of idiot do you take me for!” she finally bursts out, furious and spitting and struggling for words. She yanks her other hand free with a furious wrench, but Trish isn’t that easily dissuaded. She grabs Kat by the shoulders before she can fly to her feet. 

“Because they were trying to find someone, anyone, to take you out so your sister can date,” Trish says, her voice low but intent, her words flying a mile a minute at Kat like she’s scared to stop and take a breath. Like Kat will disappear in a puff of smoke the second she does. “It was stupid, I didn’t need the excuse. But I didn’t want the competition. That’s all it was. I haven’t spent a cent of it, it wasn’t important. I just-”

“Competition?” Kat asks, suddenly feeling lost - though frustration is still lurking, licking at her heels, as she points out, “what, because I’m known to be such a wild party girl? Right. Always on the prowl, that’s me. A new boy on my arm every night just waiting to pick a fight with you for my hand.”

She lets her disgust colour her words as clearly as she can and Trish winces; hesitates a moment before plowing back into her argument.

“It’s like you said that night at Club Skunk,” she replies, looking tired all of a sudden. “What was it… ‘don’t assume that just because I have good taste in music and sometimes I wear leather, that it means I’m a lesbian’?”

Kat stares, lips working silently.

Trish gazes back at her for a long moment, until something seems to shut down in her eyes and she turns away. Her hands drop from Kat’s shoulders and she makes a movement like she’s going to stand, putting her hand down on the porch beside her to push herself up.

Kat’s hand gets there before she can, her fingers settling lightly, indecisively, on top of Trish’s.

“Why are you telling me now?” Kat asks softly as Trish’s head whips back around.

Trish exhales heavily before she answers. “I guess the more time we spent together, the worse I felt about it.”

Kat feels her eyebrow arch back up without her permission as she answers. “What, it was only a dumb thing to do if I’m not a stranger anymore?”

“Of course not. It’s just… I don’t know. It was stupid, I do stupid things sometimes. But I liked having the excuse. I….” Trish trails off, a self-deprecating grin twisting her lips as she sneaks a look at Kat. She settles a little more heavily onto the steps again as she does, beside Kat now instead of across from her. But she doesn’t move her hand away. “It wasn’t the first time I’ve wanted to ask you out,” she finishes softly.

Swallowing hard, Kat lets her eyes roam over Trish; examining the profile of her face and the nervous pressing together of her lips as she waits for Kat’s response. “Since before you disappeared last year?” Kat asks.

Trish ducks her head, colour rising in her cheeks. “Since long before,” she says.

Kat blinks, her hand tightening over Trish’s. “Oh. Wow. Okay.”

Trish flicks another glance her way and Kat panics, hurrying to turn away. She jerks Trish’s hand forward as she turns, settling awkwardly beside her with their knees brushing and their hands still clasped loosely.

“I didn’t-”

“I know.”

“If I’d known-”

“I know.”

“Trish-”

“Kat,” Trish replies, voice low. For the first time in a long, interminable time - has it been ten minutes or twenty, or has it been hours because it feels like hours to Kat. It feels like they'd run a marathon together in the length of this conversation - her voice sounds amused again. Like when they’d just been trading the real stories behind the legends that circulated the school about them. “It’s okay. I don’t- I didn’t want it to be weird and loaded. I just wanted a chance to get to know you.”

Kat swallows hard, at a loss for words. But Trish doesn’t leave her hanging and raises their linked hands up together until she can kiss the back of Kat’s hand.

“I should go. Give you some time to think,” she says. Kat just blinks up at her stupidly as Trish finally gets to her feet, and her hand feels cold as it drops into her lap, empty. Trish hovers over her, scrubbing a hand through the back of hair and looking nervous again. “I’ll understand if you- well. If you want to talk, or… I don’t know, ask me questions. Interrogate me. Stick me against a wall and throw darts at me or whatever, I don’t mind. You just- you know where to find me.”

“Darts are exactly the kind of backwater country bumpkin bullshit I’d expect people to play in that awful bar you go to,” Kat replies distantly, the familiar banter rolling off her tongue without a second thought. “I’m sure I can come up with a far more interesting punishment than that.”

Relief breaks across Trish’s face like a wave, though she tries to hide it by running her hand over her face and covering her mouth as she fights back a smile. “Sure, whatever you want. I’m all yours.”

Kat just nods and watches as Trish starts down the path, heading for the sidewalk. Then Kat finds herself up, on her feet without thinking.

“Patricia,” she calls as she crosses the space between them in long strides. “Trish,” she repeats more softly as she reaches the edge of her front yard, just as Trish spins back.

It’s like looking at the sun, seeing that expression of relief still on Trish’s face. It makes Kat want to squint. Instead she grabs Trish by the back of her neck and tugs, closing her eyes against the brightness of it all as she pulls Trish into a kiss.

That anger is still sitting in her stomach even if the flames have died back into smouldering coals, but it can wait. She has a feeling she’s probably going to want to yell a bit. Or maybe a lot. But- later, it can wait until later. For when she’s done tracing Trish’s jaw with her fingertips and licking her way past Trish’s lips. When Trish has finished reeling her in with tight arms around Kat’s waist, like she’s never going to let her go. It can all just… wait.


End file.
